Lost Reactions
by Apocalypsefantasy
Summary: Just a little taste of what I think everyone's reactions were directly after Buffy's death in "The Gift". Slight emphasis on Spike and Dawn.


Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all affiliated characters are property of Joss Wheden and are in no way owned by me.

AN/: I rewatched season five recently and couldn't help but write this little piece of angst. Just everyone's reactions to Buffy's death.

Lost Reactions

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A hush crept over the gang as they each took in the sight that made their victory obsolete. Xander, carrying his injured fiancée, went numb and Anya hid her face against his shoulder. Willow and Tara clung to each other for support, sobs of denial shaking the red headed wicca's frame as her lover held her, silent tears running down her cheeks. A storm of emotions flooded Giles at the sight of his slayer, whom he loved like a daughter, killed for, lying broken on the rubble covered ground. Spike's unbeating heart shattered and he fell awkwardly to his knees burying his bloody face in his equally bloody hands, the woman he loved beyond all reason was- he couldn't think it, torment like nothing he had felt in his extremely long life welled where his soul should be and he cried out pitifully with the pain of it. And Dawn walked the last few steps to the ground in a daze to view the result of the events on the tower. Her sister lay spread eagle and broken on a pile of rubble; her white shirt unstained by blood only seemed to increase the reality that, it wasn't supposed to happen, it wasn't natural, that it should have been her, Dawn's sister the slayer had jumped into a portal opened by Dawn's blood, to save the world, to save her, and since they shared the same blood it would close at the slayers sacrifice as well as for Dawn's.

No matter whose mind the thought was there….Buffy. Colored in grief and anger and denial but there always…. Buffy, Buffy, Buffy. This wasn't like Joyce's death; it wasn't a natural occurrence, that, though painful, happened in life, this was an abomination a twisted cosmic joke. They had the 'why' and that was worse than having no answer to the question, the why didn't justify the loss.

Giles was the first to move he broke the silence with but a whisper "We should move her, the authorities…." He trailed off.

"I should tell Angel" Willow said but didn't move. Spike was too lost in his own mind to even scowl at the mention of his grandsire. No one accept Dawn knew the full story of what had transpired on top of the tower, but she knew she'd have to tell them, she had messages to deliver.

_Doc, the crazy old demon man with the lizard tongue, had drawn Dawn's blood and easily thrown Spike off the tower before he could save her, likewise Buffy had pushed Doc off the tower without an ounce of effort, but it was too late the portal was opening, it had Dawn's blood and streaks of blue lightening energy were emanating from it raining destruction down on Sunnydale, and demons of all verity were emerging from portals zapping into existence everywhere._

"_I'm sorry" Dawn said._

"_It doesn't matter" Buffy replied but Dawn had lurched toward the portal. Buffy caught her before her sister even took a step. "What are doing?" She demanded in a tone that was concerned strong and questioned Dawn's sanity all at once._

"_I have to jump in the energy." Dawn had croaked._

"_It'll kill you" Buffy wouldn't let Dawn go of Dawn's forearms._

"_I know" Dawn had replied and she had full understanding what jumping would do and Dawn knew she had to and she willing to if it would save the world. "Buffy I know about the ritual," She continued, "I have to stop it"_

"_No" Buffy rejected, the tower jerked unsteadily beneath them, pressing their time limit home with balance shaking clarity._

"_I have to, look at what's happening," another energy bolt streaked past them opening a portal which a dragon flew out of. "Buffy you have to let me go. The blood starts it and until the blood stops flowing it'll never stop. You know you have to let me. It has to have the blood."_

_The sister's shared a tortured gaze and then an epiphany hit Buffy. Something Spike said, _It always has to be blood_, the hospital she and Dawn _look it's blood, Summer's blood it's just like mine_, isn't that what she had told Dawn, Dawn was made from Buffy the monks had made her out of Buffy they were the same person. Her gift, death, this was it; this is what the primitive had meant. The love she had for Dawn would lead her to her gift, to death. Dawn saw the thought in Buffy's eyes as she turned toward the horizon, and when Buffy looked back her, Dawn could see her resolve was set._

"_Buffy" Dawn mouthed "No" she had found her voice even if shaky, not that anything but that._

"_Dawnie I have to"_

"_No" Dawn denied._

"_Listen to me please there's not a lot of time, listen" Buffy pleaded. Dawn's lip trembled tears streamed down her face but she listened wide eyed to her sister's final words._

"_Dawn listen to me listen. I love you. I will always love you. This is the work that I have to do. Tell Giles I-tell Giles I figured it out and that I'm ok. Give my love to my friends you have to take care of them now; you have to take care of each other. You have to be strong. Dawn the hardest thing in this world is to live in it, be brave live, for me." Then Buffy leaned down and kissed her sister on the cheek turned and took the few long strides to the end of the platform at a run, gracefully launching herself into the vortex arms out legs together. The light illuminated her for a moment, truly a hero's death and Dawn sobbed as silently as possible._

Dawn had descended from the tower in a daze her tears all used up, trying to be strong like Buffy had wanted.

Giles was getting his head back trying to take charge "No one can know" he whispered everyone heard and he could tell they were listening even if not a one turned to face him. "Without a slayer to guard the Hellmouth Sunnydale will be overrun. We have to keep Buffy's death" Everyone flinched, "a secret. We should take her back to the house for now." He finished lamely.

Spike rose unsteadily to his feet, ignoring his injuries and limped forward still crying unabashedly. Not even Xander objected when the vampire who had loved his friend stooped down to tenderly brush back a strand of hair from Buffy's face and then scooped her gently into his arms.

All was quiet and still in Sunnydale, minus all the crying; the sun had risen on the damaged streets and police sirens blared outside the windows, but no one in the Summers' residence cared. Willow sat on Dawn's bed, rocking herself back and forth, as Tara held her, tears streaming down her face, both hardly made a sound other than the sobs. The two witches huddled together seeking comfort from the other's presence.

On the couch Anya lay with her head in Xander's lap while he stroked her hair and pressed an icepack to her forehead. Even after the pile of rubble fell on her she refused to be taken to a hospital and though Xander fought her on that choice they had other things to worry about. Anya didn't know what to think or feel, Buffy dead was not something she was expecting or able to process so she chose not to, as far as she would admit Buffy was upstairs with Dawn, sleeping after a long battle.

However in the basement of the Summers' home noise signaling violence was halted by the insulated door as Giles blamed himself and took it out on his surroundings. Buffy was his responsibility and he had let her go off her path he should have stopped her fighting after finding the prophecy of her death in the Codex cheating death once is all you get she was lucky she hadn't stayed to rot in the Master's church. His slayer had been a hero that much was all he knew he couldn't live on what ifs and should haves. Then he made a choice; Buffy would above everything else want Dawn to be happy and taken care of which also meant that they were going to keep Dawn out of the system no one could know that Buffy Summers was dead and No one could know the Slayer was gone they had a lot of work to do.

Upstairs in what was once the Slayer's bedroom, Spike sat watching as the Slayer's sister mourned the women he had loved. Her body laid out as if in sleep. _It's not her_ he told himself _she's gone that's not her, she's not in there._ Guilt racked Spike as the vision of Buffy's sacrifice replayed in his head. _I should have saved Dawn while I had the chance Buffy would have never jumped off that bloody tower if I wasn't so thick headed. I had to kill one sodding old man but he had no trouble pushing me off the bloody platform._

The sound of a fist through wall made Dawn jump. She wheeled around to see Spike his fist protruding from a large hole, and even larger dent, in the wall. "Sorry, pet, didn't mean to scare you."

Dawn nodded, she had spoken only to repeat Buffy's final words to the rest of the group, she had not uttered a sound since, she hadn't even cried. She wasn't even sure if she had any tears to shed. Spike had refused to leave either of the Summers' sides, which worked out since Dawn refused to be more than ten feet from Buffy's body at any given time.

"You can cry ya know Niblet, no one'll blame you." He didn't bother trying to explain to himself the desire to comfort the girl or the oddity of having affection for not just humans, but the Slayer and her family, he had long ago accepted the insanity of that notion.

"I have no right to cry." If it weren't for vampire hearing Spike would have missed the soft admission.

Spike raised an eyebrow at her, but Dawn didn't turn her gaze away from her sister's face. "Way I see it pet, you've more a right to cry than any of the soddin' Scoobies."

The look she gave him was enough to turn the pieces of his shattered heart to dust. "None of them have her blood on their hands." Spike didn't miss the small crack in her voice or the tightening of her hands in her lap.

With a slightly uncomfortable sigh Spike pushed off the wall and sat next to Dawn on the bed, studiously avoiding looking at Buffy's body only inches away. "Dawn, this was Buffy's choice, she choose to protect you." Reluctantly Dawn raised her gaze to meet Spike's demanding blue eyes. "Big Sis wouldn't want you blaming yourself pet." No the blaming himself was his gig, and the Slayer's, anything gone wrong was somehow one of their faults. He gave her a lopsided grin. "'Sides once a Summers gets an idea in 'er head there's no stoppin' 'er."

Dawn let a wan smile lift the corner of her mouth, like the time she thought she could play couples' therapist for mom and dad; she dressed up in one of mom's business suits and everything." Spike chuckled at the mental image.

"Bet that was a right laugh."

"She was a horrible therapist, but she got mom and dad talking again, at least for a little while." An uncomfortable silence fell upon the pair, like a stifling blanket; both sets of eyes eventually coming to rest on the woman lying in the bed next to them. "Ya know if she was talking nonsense, I'd think she was sleeping."

Spike opened his mouth to offer some kind of comforting words and instead blurted, "Slayer talks in 'er sleep?"

Dawn looked up at him, "yeah, all the time. When we shared a room back in LA I'd listen her and use her nightly ramblings as blackmail."

A smile curved the edge of his lips, Spike covered by sticking a cigarette between them, Dawn didn't seem to notice as she kept talking. "I knew, the night it happened,…her becoming the Slayer. I was hardly ten at the time, but I'd followed her after she sunk out. Got kinda creeped when she went to meet some tweedy guy in a graveyard. That night was the first time she saved my life, her first staking, she missed the heart, but when she heard me scream when I saw the second vamp, there was dust before I knew what was happening." There was quiet, Spike said nothing, sensing the youngest and now only Summers had more to say. "But that never really happened, I wasn't even there, all those times Buffy saved me, protected me…all the times I covered for her when she went patrolling." Dawn voice grew hard, accusatory. "Think they knew, the monks? It would make sense right, they made me from her think they knew her blood would work, so they put all these memories in her, of me, made her think that…that she had to…" Unable to sit still Dawn lurched to her feet and began pacing, "God! She's such an idiot, always has been, thinks she's immortal or something."

_Problem with you Summers is that you've gotten so good you're starting to think you're immortal. _"Not immortal pet, Slayer just knew she could handle herself."

Dawn turned back to face the vampire her eyes screaming her pain, her voice whispering it. "Couldn't she have just been immortal." And she broke, falling into a heap on the carpet and sobbing and screaming unintelligibly. Clutching herself as if to hold together the pieces of her slipping reality.

On instinct Spike crotched down beside her, tentatively putting an arm around the teen; Dawn turned into him, clutching the duster like a life line as she sobbed. Spike held her as she cried and he wept too.

The next twenty-four hours passed in that agonizing blur of grief for Dawn and Spike; for the other Scoobies, the real Scoobies it passed in a list, things to do or cover up or pretend. Willow had gone to LA of the mind that Buffy's death wasn't something to be discussed over a phone call. Anya had gone to the Magic Box, someone had to watch the money, or cry on the money as she had taken to doing. Xander, his task was a morbid one; he was building a coffin, her coffin. Tara had a similarly depressing task; finding a place to lay Buffy to rest, after all her death was to be a secret, her grave had to be as well, besides Buffy would have hated being put in a cemetery someone had to find a better place. Giles, Giles was writing, a decision spurred on by a conversation he'd had with Buffy months ago. _Where are the details? Why didn't the Watchers keep fuller accounts of it? _He was going to make sure at least one Slayer's death was fully accounted for. Spike took care of Dawn and the two of them watched the body.

In the city of angels, a group of six mix-matched demon fighters strode up to the Hyperion hotel all grateful for the promise of warm beds and hot showers, after all demon dimensions didn't have very nice accommodations. "Can I say it? I wanna say it." Angel said cheerily pushing his way to the front of the group toward the hotel's doors.

"Say what?" Wesley asked in confusion turning to gun for an explanation.

Angel threw open the Hyperion's doors and dramatically announced, "There's no place like-" a petite red head was sitting on a couch in the lobby, worrying her hands in her lap and looking horribly forlorn. "Willow." Said girl's eyes looked up from her lap to meet his as she rose, that look on her face and her posture dropping a boulder of foreboding in his stomach, and worse understanding. He cut across Cordelia's half formed 'what's wrong' with his own statement. "It's Buffy."

Willow could only nod numbly at him; she couldn't bear to say the words that would surely break the vampire's unbeating heart. Cordy rushing to Willow's side took that responsibility from her. "What about Buffy, is she in trouble, is she hurt, does she need help?"

"Coredelia," Wesley tried seeing the effect the questions were having on the young witch.

"She's dead." Angel deadpanned into the room, the high ceiling of the Hyperion making the soft sorrowful words echo throughout the lobby.

A sob wrenched itself from Willow's chest and she collapsed in a heap against Cordy, her cries filling the hotel with grief.

IT was odd, this wasn't the first time he'd said those words, over four years ago Angel had followed the sewer line to the Master's church to find Buffy face-down and dead in the pooling water, yet he'd been high on adrenalin then and grief hadn't touched him; now he found it all too surreal. Buffy was dead, he was numb, shocked, and his heart ached, but it was whole, it hadn't shattered and killed him the instant Buffy left this world, vaguely he wondered when it had happened, why hadn't he felt her leave. He grieved more for the lack of grief than he did for Buffy.

Light, light and warmth, there was nothing else, only the blissful peace of her own existence. She'd never been much for religion or philosophy maybe because those got too close to the big questions that she had always known she would be confronted with too soon. _Every Slayer has a death wish. _The words echoed in her memory softer than she'd ever truly heard them. _I understand why._ She didn't think she had a body, or if she did she couldn't feel it or see it. There was no real desire to either, she was perfectly content to be consumed by oblivious peace, everyone she cared about was alright, it didn't matter if she couldn't place their names or faces, or even her own. She was the Slayer, she had died as the Slayer and that was what she was now. She was at peace.

AN/: Well that was depressing.


End file.
